This article in The Crime Report examines a recent report about New York City noise by New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli. It’s fascinating read and carefully documents the chronic problem of noise in New York City along what the City has been doing (and not doing) to address it. More importantly, the article notes that “[n]oise complaints may be a clue to what else is going on in an apartment,” such as child or elder abuse or drug dealing, and, in any event, “not enforcing noise ordinances creates an environment that encourages lawbreaking.”

The author of the article is GrowNYC board member Arline Bronzaft, PhD, who is also a co-founder of The Quiet Coalition. In her article, Dr. Bronzaft discusses the link between crime and noise and why the City should devote more enforcement resources to the issue to improve the health, safety and welfare of New York City’s residents.

Thank you, Dr. Bronzaft for your passionate and long-term commitment to this subject!

In addition to serving as vice chair of the The Quiet Coalition, David Sykes chairs several professional organizations in acoustical science: The Acoustics Research Council, American National Standards Institute Committee S12, Workgroup 44, The Rothschild Foundation Task Force on Acoustics, and the FGI Acoustics Working Group—a partner of the American Hospital Association. He is the lead author of “Sound & Vibration 2.0 (2012, Springer-Verlag), a contributor to the National Academy of Engineering report “Technology for a Quieter America,” and to the US-GSA guidance “Sound Matters”, and co-founded the Laboratory for Advanced Research in Acoustics (LARA) at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He recently retired from the board of directors of the American Tinnitus Association. A graduate of the University of California/Berkeley with graduate degrees from Cornell University, he is a frequent organizer of and speaker at professional conferences in the U.S., Europe, Asia, and the Middle East.